While Abstract Expressionism by painters such as Jackson Pollock and Mark Rothko...
A display in the exhibit “Alberto Giacometti: Toward the Ultimate Figure” at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston is shown Thursday, Nov. 10, 2022, in Houston.Alberto Giacometti’s haunting figures stand so far alone in the history of modern art it would be easy to assume that their radical skinny, chiseled style came to him as a flash of genius.
Spread across much of the MFAH’s 20,000-square foot Upper Brown Pavilion, the exhibition looks deceptively spare. Giacometti wanted his signature standing and walking figures to appear as if they were being seen from a distance, but he never had — and apparently didn’t want — all that much space.11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wednesdays, 11 a.m.-9 p.m. Thursdays, 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Fridays-Saturdays, 12:30-6 p.m. Sundays, through Feb. 12$18-$23, children 12 and under free; 713-639-7300; mfah.
Giacometti’s early visits to the Louvre and the Musee d’Ethnographie yielded such early minimalist, abstract pieces as “Spoon Woman” , which shows his early fascination with fertility figures; and “Woman ,” a mesmerizing chunk of onyx-hued brass. Giacometti’s most frequent models were his brother Diego, who also was his studio assistant; and his wife, Annette, whom he met in Geneva during the war. He also sculpted portraits of mistresses and other friends; and just as importantly, he painted portraits. A trio of paintings from the Art Institute of Chicago and the Menil Collection, unique to the MFAH show, add that dimension to the narrative.
Even at that scale or slightly taller — say, six inches — there’s tension between the standing figures’ vigorously worked, expressive surfaces and their quietude. They could be materializing or dematerializing; ancient or modern, depending on your mood. And that’s before you notice the shadows they cast.
Another room grounds his sculpture within the craggy alpine landscape of his childhood. The figures of “The Glade” are discernable as lanky conifers; while the bulky torsos of busts made in the 1950s and '60s look as solid as rocky mountaintops. Stampa also loomed large for Giacometti as a memory of his distant, idyllic childhood, Dumas suggested.
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